veggies and fruits question

How do you count yours. Especially in the wintertime I don't eat many fruits. Do you just combine and make up for them with veggies or treat them as separate entities?
I still group them together and am striving for 8 servings a day combined.

I treat mine separately, but that's the way my plan (Jenny Craig) is designed. The number of servings of each depend on your calorie level. With non-starchy vegetables, you are supposed to have AT LEAST 3 per day on the 1200 calorie level; you can have as much as you like over that, however. (Starchy vegetables -- winter squash, potatoes, peas/beans, corn, etc., count as starch exchanges.) In general a vegetable serving is 1/2 cup cooked or 1 cup raw. For fruits, at 1200 calories you get 2 and it goes up from there. In the winter, there are times when some fruits are actually in season. Right now, navel oranges and grapefruit are at their peak. In the fall tropical fruits are in. etc. I eat a lot of bananas and granny smith apples year round. I also eat a lot of dried fruit -- raisins, cranberries, apricots, etc. -- and frozen unsweetened fruit is good, too.

I lump fruits and vegetables together. I think I it just because I eat a lot more vegetables than I do fruits. I always plan vegetables into my meals - fruits tend to be an afterthought for snacks, a sweet tooth, etc.

I kind of lump mine together too. It's SO MUCH harder to get decent fruit in the winter! Seems like it always comes down to the "basic 4"--bananas, pears, apples, & oranges. Sigh. I've never been all that fond of oranges, apples make me HUNGRIER, and I like B & P, but they're fairly high cal when compared to veggies (I'm a calorie counter). I've been eating a lot of satsumas & tangerines so far and I do make a point to alternate in the rest just to be sure I'm covering my vitamin base.

i do mine together too but during winter i don't get many fruits, if any, either. in summer i LOVE buying different kinds for the kids and myself to try so its not a problem to get all the fruits in... because i dont get many fruits in right now i try to aim between 6 and 9 servings.

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shelly--
(formerly jkfla, originally joined june 2000)

I forget about pineapple chunks. I think I am going to get some canned fruit in so I can get my fruit in as well. I try to eat blueberries as they have been written about over and over again as one the "superfoods". In fact tomorrow morning I am going to make a blueberry smoothy with plain non fat yogurt.

I view them separately. I find if I aim for a couple of different veggies at both lunch and dinner, I'm getting a reasonable amount.

Fruit is more difficult for me, and I should make a conscious effort to ensure I'm eating enough. Unless I have my cereal with raisins, and a fruit shake, I rarely get the recommended number of servings.